Phantoms
by Miss Vix
Summary: Dis: not mine, never will be mine.  Rufus' mother never died.... and neither did his brother.The President will be unhappy to know what's happening, though he won't have long to be angry about it.


_Momma! Momma NO!_

The words echoed through her mind as she lay on the uncomfortable thing that they liked to call a bed. Her nearly lifeless, dull green eyes were staring up at the ceiling, thinking back on that dreadful day.

How long had she been here?

The last she knew, it had been at least six years, and she knew she would never get to see her children again. Her little ones, left in the care of that...that...BRUTE. She didn't know that her oldest had gotten away, that he was somewhat safely being kept away from her husband, though it would probably make her stay there a lot easier, knowing that at least one of them was safe.

Like a broken record, the scene of her very last night, and what looked to her children to be her death, played over and over in her mind, providing the health care officials and her doctors with enough of a reason to keep her in this place. It wasn't as though they actually TRIED to help her get over it, far from it. If anything, they made it worse by keeping her isolated, only letting her out every once in a while to socialize, for fear that if she was around people enough, the whole story of who she was and why she was there would come out, and they just couldn't have that.

That was what they were being paid to KEEP from getting out to the general public.

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"Auntie Bella?" The eight year old redhead looked up at the woman he knew to be his aunt. He had been living with her for the past six years, ever since his mother had been killed by his father in front of he and his brother.

...his brother...

He wasn't sure of how he had gotten out of the door and down the stairs, not at his age when everything had happened, but luckily enough, he had run into one of the junior Turks as he tried to escape from his father, and had been taken to his Aunt's home, Isabella Tarshil. The Turk had promised to keep him a secret, to make sure that his father never got a hold of him again. He'd seen what the man did to the two year old, and he could never let the President have the redhead back.

"Yes, Renny?" Isabella looked up from the table, where she was trying to figure out just how they could keep the child a secret any longer. "What is it baby?"

"I want to see Momma's grave..."

Her breath caught in her throat, and she shook her head, "I-..I'm sorry, Ren, but you know we can't. It's too dangerous for you to go to Midgar right now." She had never lied to Reno, never. She didn't want to be one of those foster parents that waited until the child was in his teens before she told him that he was adopted. That was not the kind of trauma that he needed, and besides, he knew what had happened anyway, even though he was so very young when it had.

"But...please? I want to see Momma, and maybe we could see 'fus...Auntie Bella, I wanna go, pretty please?" Reno's green eyes were locked onto his aunt's and gave her his best puppy eyes. "I really want to go. I know I need to stay away from Papa, but I want to see 'fus and Momma."

"Reno, No. We can't go to Midgar. If your father even knew you were still alive, if he knew I was the one caring for you... he'd storm Wutai and take you back just so he could finish what he had started." She shook her head, hating that she had to tell him no, but there was no other answer he could get at this point in time.

The boy looked downtrodden, and more than a bit angry. Of course, he should have know... his father was the one that STILL dictated everything, even without him even being nearby, or even in the same COUNTRY. "Fine..." He turned around and raced back up to his room, just a light flicker of a glow around him. He was tired of his father still controlling his life even though he was so far away from him.

With a sigh, Isabella looked back down at the papers in front of her. It was getting harder to keep Reno from being discovered by his father, though she was certain that Wutai would be the last place he would look.

Perhaps she could take Reno on a little vacation, farther away from his father, and for just a few days. A slender hand ran though her red curls, her tired green eyes brightening a bit. Costa Del Sol... He hadn't been there before, so he would likely enjoy the ocean, and the chance to get out of the house.

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"Tseng, I do not WANT to go to my father's office." Cold, crystalline blue eyes glared at the Wutain, refusing to budge from his bed. "I was up late las night because of that STUPID party he had, where I was paraded around like some kind of show dog, and I would rather get more sleep than go to HIS office." Even for a boy at the tender age of seven, Rufus ShinRa had already perfected his poise and coldness.

...just as his father had wished for.

"Rufus, there is no room for arguing. He said to be there in ten minutes, or your punishment," The Turk winced visibly, as did Rufus, "would be even worse than last time. He is growing tired of the insolence, and is highly annoyed that you are acting now how your brother acted when he was only two years old."

At the mention of his brother, Rufus' eyes grew even harder, his expression stormy. "Oh, yes, and look where that landed him. He's dead, and father can't AFFORD to kill me off. Mother's dead, brother's dead, and if he killed me, he would not have an heir to the ShinRa throne. He would not dare kill me." He stood up and stalked towards the bathroom. "Tell him I will be there just as soon as I am showered and dressed properly. Would not want to disappoint Daddy Dearest by showing up dressed in anything less than a suit with perfectly gelled hair."

Tseng shook his head and walked from the room. "It will be your hide, Rufus, but I will inform him." _How I ever got stuck with being his bodyguard, I will never know... _


End file.
